


Sorrows (About That Melancholy Storm)

by seekrest



Series: Twelve Days of Terror: A Whumptober Collection [10]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, Hurt Peter Parker, Michelle Jones Deserves Better, Peter Parker Gets a Hug, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Whumptober 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-31 19:27:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21150971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekrest/pseuds/seekrest
Summary: Peter braced himself as he hears the door open, opening his eyes but staring straight ahead - seeing May walk in with Tony behind her.“Pete? Hey sweetheart, it’s time to go.”Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing.He can hear Tony speaking in the background, his voice fading as Peter’s mind goes elsewhere.May. Tony. Ned. They’re all there for him, they’ll all be there today.Except one.The only one Peter can think about.The one they’re burying today.





	Sorrows (About That Melancholy Storm)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [This Living Hand (I Hold It Towards You)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20882957) by [seekrest](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekrest/pseuds/seekrest). 

> Prompts: Numb / “the wind, the rain, the cold”
> 
> Second prompt taken from [ hailingstar’s Halloween list ](https://hailing-stars.tumblr.com/post/187781459998/13-nights-of-halloween)
> 
> Once again, I’m sorry™️

“Pete, you ready?” 

Peter says nothing, hearing May and Tony whisper to each other behind his closed door. 

“I don’t think he’ll ever be ready for this.” May whispered, Peter sitting on his bed - feet on the floor as he heard Tony sigh. 

“I hate the idea of making him go but if we don’t,” he hears Tony pause, closing his eyes as Tony continues, “I think he’ll regret it. Later, I mean.”

“I think you’re right. I just…”

“I know.” Tony answers.

Peter braced himself as he hears the door open, opening his eyes but staring straight ahead - seeing May walk in with Tony behind her.

“Pete? Hey sweetheart, it’s time to go.” 

Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing. 

He hears May bend down before he sees her, leaning down until he can’t help but look at her - meeting her eyes.

“I know it’s hard. _ I know _. But we have to go, alright? Tony and I will be right there with you, Ned and his family are meeting us there.”

Peter says nothing, not even acknowledging May’s spoken as he starts to look beyond her. 

He can hear Tony speaking in the background, his voice fading as Peter’s mind goes elsewhere.

May. Tony. Ned. They’re all there for him, they’ll all be there today.

Except one. 

The only one Peter can think about. 

The one they’re burying today.

* * *

The cemetery is quiet, almost too quiet when he arrives. 

May and Tony flank him on each side but then from one moment to the next, there’s Ned - right in front of him with tears in his eyes, red-rimmed and choking back a sob.

“Peter.”

Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing. 

He lets Ned hug him, feels how warm and tight his embrace is but Peter can’t bring himself to return it. He lets Ned sob into his shoulder until someone - maybe May - leads him away, Peter feeling as if he’s being led somewhere else.

The gentle hand behind him is Tony’s, that much Peter can understand. But it’s when they stand over the grave site, when Peter sees Michelle’s parents that his breath starts to hitch.

“Pete?”

Peter says nothing, the world moving both sharply into focus and completely out of range. It hits him, viscerally, where they are now - the realization hitting him over and over again.

He sees her parents, sees the brokenness in their expression - the complete and utter devastation of what they had lost, of what Peter had stolen from them - and it nearly sends him over the edge, the only thing keeping him from letting himself fall into the hole in the ground being Tony’s hand on his shoulder.

“Pete, I’m right here. We’re right here.”

He hears Tony’s voice but it’s meaningless to him now, Peter’s mind going elsewhere as he starts to take in his surroundings.

The sky is dark, gloomy - a perfect mirror of the storm in Peter’s heart. He can’t remember his parents’ funeral but he remembers Ben’s - a sunny day that seemed to mock him as he grieved.

But today it was as if the universe allowed him this one thing - just the one - to allow the world around him to feel as cold and as dark and as numb as Peter had felt since the moment Michelle died.

He sees it again and again, an endless loop that plays in his mind. Beck’s hand around her neck, Michelle gasping and clawing at his hands, Peter watching in horror as Beck threw her off the bridge. 

Peter’s nightmares - awake, asleep, he sees it all the time - go over each moment on the bridge, but it’s those few seconds when she’s in the air, when Peter’s hand is extended - the web still contained in his wrist - that he hears it, the truth that his mind can’t deny.

Tony told him it wasn’t his fault, over and over again - Peter getting the feeling that he would’ve told him that regardless of what had happened. 

But Peter knows it is - knows it as well as he can know anything. Because Michelle wasn’t dead when Beck was holding her, wasn’t dead when she was flung off the bridge.

Peter knows it. 

Because all he can ever hear are her screams.

* * *

How long they’re at cemetery, Peter doesn’t know. All his mind can revolve around is that night, hand extended - seconds before he ended the life of the first girl he’s ever loved, an ache in his heart of whether he’ll ever be able to love again.

He can’t, Peter can’t even think of it - not when it’d been his fault that she’d been taken, not when it was his fault that Michelle was dead.

And it was, Peter knows it. Nothing Tony could ever say would solve it.

Peter sees it again, over and over - the loop that will haunt him for the rest of his life.

Michelle screaming, hands extended toward him.

Peter’s own voice, yelling for her - a hand and a web shot quickly - reaching for her way too fast.

In his darkest moments, Peter’s mind let’s him hear the snap, the exact moment he caught her - fast, way too fast - but in every other instance, all Peter hears is silence, the ringing in his ears and his panicked breathing overwhelming him as he landed, bringing his web closer to him.

He’d noticed it even then, the odd angle of her neck - how silent she’d become. But Peter hadn’t been able to accept it, shaking and sobbing so hard and so loudly that the realization of what had happened - of what he had done - not hitting him until he’d been in Tony’s arms, Tony rocking him back and forth as he cried on that balcony.

Peter watches as people start to leave, sees the concerned looks from friends from school, from Ned, May and Tony.

But Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing.

Peter hasn’t cried since that night, hasn’t felt anything - has barely said a word.

There’s nothing to say.

Michelle is dead.

And it was all his fault. 

* * *

It’s when Michelle’s parents walk towards him that Peter realizes that they’re almost alone - the only ones still around on a dark day made darker because Michelle wasn’t around.

The sun is gone, as it should be - Peter lets himself think, wondering if Michelle took all the brightness and love and life in Peter’s world the night that she died.

He watches them come up to him, tears in her dad’s face and a haunted look on her mom’s. Peter feels something then, a twinge - his walls barely containing the grief, the shame, the agony threatening to consume him - a horror that Peter can’t allow himself to feel.

“She loved you. So much.” He hears her mom say, Peter forcing himself to meet her eyes - no matter how painful and agonizing it is.

Peter can’t bring himself to say anything, hearing May’s voice over the ringing in his ears that’s growing louder and louder.

“We’re so sorry for your loss.”

He watches as they nod, Michelle’s mom still staring into his eyes. 

She says nothing more but Peter doesn’t need words, knows without saying the pain that she’s feeling. 

Some more words are said, Peter doesn’t hear him - his eyes going back to the hole where Michelle’s casket now lay. 

He lets out a choked breath, immediately feeling Tony and May’s presence by his side.

“Peter?”

“Pete, you with us?”

But Peter swallows it down.

Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing.

Michelle is dead. They buried her today.

And it was all Peter’s fault.

* * *

They make it home, how - Peter doesn’t know. 

Tony says something to him, Peter seeing the concern and love in his eyes, knowing that he’ll be around again tomorrow - as he had been every day since the night Michelle had died. 

May helps him out of his suit jacket and his shoes, pushing his hair back until she kissed his forehead - Peter sitting back on the bed, feet on the floor as he stared straight ahead. 

“I’m here for you, Peter. Whatever you need. I’m right here, okay baby?”

Peter says nothing. Feels nothing. Is nothing.

May leaves at some point, Peter hearing the door close behind her.

When she does, Peter lets out a shaky breath - the reality and the horror of what he’d seen today, where he’d gone - settling over him in waves.

They buried Michelle today. 

Michelle was dead.

Peter hadn’t saved her.

_ She was dead. _

He feels the sob building in his throat, his hands shaking as the walls he had so painstakingly built all start to come crashing down.

May is back in his room in an instant, Peter hearing her sobs ring out - only to realize some time later that they’re not hers, they’re his.

Peter falls into her arms, May kneeling in front of him as the horror washes over him again and again. 

Peter cries, words and pain and agony coming out of him as she holds him.

Peter feels everything - the hurt, the terror, the reality and truth that Michelle was gone, that she’d died because of him - that he’d been too late to save her.

Peter is everything - everything, all at once - knowing that there would be nothing that would be able to cure the deep and jagged cut to his heart, a wound that Peter knows will never heal.

The crack of the thunder outside is the only thing louder than his cries, his whole body shaking as the storm outside continues to pour.

Michelle was dead.

And Peter wondered, a sinking feeling in his gut - if he would ever truly feel alive again too. 

**Author's Note:**

> If you need a pick-me-up, pls consider checking out my [ six-month anniversary fic ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21124730) — something maybe not happier, but a lot more sweet :)


End file.
